PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE This article was downloaded by: [Li, Shing-Han] On: 24 January 2011 Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 932594577] Publisher Taylor & Francis Informa Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37- 41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK Production Planning & Control Publication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713737146 Improving the efficiency of IT help-desk service by Six Sigma management methodology (DMAIC) - a case study of C company Shing-Han Li a ; Chi-Chuan Wu b ; David C. Yen c ; Ming-Chih Lee a a Department of Information Management, Tatung University, Taipei 104, Taiwan b Department of Business Management, Tatung University, Taipei 104, Taiwan c Department of Decision Sciences and Management Information Systems, Miami University, Oxford, OH 45056, USA First published on: 20 January 2011 To cite this Article Li, Shing-Han , Wu, Chi-Chuan , Yen, David C. and Lee, Ming-Chih(2011) 'Improving the efficiency of IT help-desk service by Six Sigma management methodology (DMAIC) - a case study of C company', Production Planning & Control,, First published on: 20 January 2011 (iFirst) To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1080/09537287.2010.503321 URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09537287.2010.503321 Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden. The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.
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PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE
This article was downloaded by: [Li, Shing-Han]On: 24 January 2011Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 932594577]Publisher Taylor & FrancisInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Production Planning & ControlPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713737146
Improving the efficiency of IT help-desk service by Six Sigma managementmethodology (DMAIC) - a case study of C companyShing-Han Lia; Chi-Chuan Wub; David C. Yenc; Ming-Chih Leea
a Department of Information Management, Tatung University, Taipei 104, Taiwan b Department ofBusiness Management, Tatung University, Taipei 104, Taiwan c Department of Decision Sciences andManagement Information Systems, Miami University, Oxford, OH 45056, USA
First published on: 20 January 2011
To cite this Article Li, Shing-Han , Wu, Chi-Chuan , Yen, David C. and Lee, Ming-Chih(2011) 'Improving the efficiency ofIT help-desk service by Six Sigma management methodology (DMAIC) - a case study of C company', ProductionPlanning & Control,, First published on: 20 January 2011 (iFirst)To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1080/09537287.2010.503321URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/09537287.2010.503321
Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf
This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial orsystematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply ordistribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.
The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contentswill be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug dosesshould be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss,actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directlyor indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.
Improving the efficiency of IT help-desk service by Six Sigma management methodology
(DMAIC) – a case study of C company
Shing-Han Lia, Chi-Chuan Wub, David C. Yenc* and Ming-Chih Leea
aDepartment of Information Management, Tatung University, No. 40, Chung-Shan North Road, Section 3, Taipei 104,Taiwan; bDepartment of Business Management, Tatung University, No. 40, Chung-Shan North Road, Section 3,Taipei 104, Taiwan; cDepartment of Decision Sciences and Management Information Systems, Miami University,
Oxford, OH 45056, USA
(Received 23 February 2010; final version received 14 June 2010)
Six Sigma concept depicts a ‘Triangle Relationship’ that integrates three attributes such as customer quality,science manners and team work. By employing this concept with the required survey and data collection to carryout the continuous improvement, a company can truly take advantage of the minimum set of operationalvariables and the lowest cost procedures, and hence, result in an increasing competitive value for/to the company.This research is conducted based on the Six Sigma methodology, DMAIC (definition, measurement, analysis,improvement and control) principle, and it deals with project-related issues to improve the efficiency ofinformation technology (IT) help-desk service through an eHelp-desk system. It is the authors’ belief that the useof eHelp-desk system can help case company to improve its service quality and efficiency. In addition, managerialimplications and research limitations are discussed at the end of this article.
Keywords: Six Sigma; DMAIC; help-desk; service quality
1. Introduction
The role and associated responsibilities of the infor-mation technology (IT) department have been broad-ened considerably over the last decade. IT departmenton one hand has served as a dominant, service rolebecause it can assist users to handle almost anycomputer problems encountered. On the other hand,it is users’ expectation that the IT department will beable to assist them with an array of tasks ranging fromhardware selection, software installation, troubleshooting, local area networks’ (LANs) connectionand virus protection, to software training. The estab-lishment of the facilities such as the information centreand help-desk reflects this trend and also confirms thecommitment to help out users. The study of DeLoneand McLean (1992, 2002, 2003) identified six measuresof IT success and indicated that the service qualitymay serve as one of the important measures to ITsuccess.
This research is conducted based on the Six Sigmaconcept, definition, measurement, analysis, improve-ment and control (DMAIC) quality improvementmethod. Its main purpose is to improve the servicequality of a company’s IT department. Although it wasMotorola that first proposed the Six Sigma quality
control system, it was GE’s aggressive use of and
improvements made to the system that promoted its
widespread business use. Due to the broad scope of the
case company’s IT applications, such as enterprise
resource planning (ERP), supply chain management
(SCM), product life-cycle management (PLM),
manufacturing execution systems (MES), network,
e-mail and the office-application, the implementation
of the Six Sigma system dramatically affected users’
routine work. The DMAIC approach has been used in
a wide range of applications and most importantly, this
approach has justified how the engineering organisa-
tion can achieve its competitive advantages, handle
efficiently the decision-making tasks and assist the
problem-solving capabilities within a business context
(Hamza 2008).In prior research, a simulation technique was
applied first to examine the existing procedure, andthen a new procedure was developed to analyse andassess the anticipated benefits. The problem was thatthe resulting estimation employed in the previousresearch provided a poor and inaccurate result. Thisresearch, on the other hand, introduces the Six Sigmaquality method to improve the present adoptedrepaired-request procedure. The aforementioned,
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improved procedure was then applied to the case com-
pany, and resulted in a substantial financial benefit
which is measured based on the amount of manpower
spent and the processing time saved.Accordingly, this research aimed to show that the
service efficiency of an IT department could be
improved by employing the Six Sigma quality
method; these Six Sigma related improvements could
then flow through to other departments within the
company. Finally, some empirical and managerial
implications are also provided in this study.
2. Literature review
2.1. The development and early application of SixSigma
The Six Sigma quality improvement method was
developed by the management at Motorola in 1980.
At that time, Motorola planned to launch the mini
pager in the Japanese market; but due to the high
volume yield of the Japanese manufacturer, the plan
failed. Thus, management launched the goal of quality
improvement. In October 1995, GE was the next
company to implement the method – Six Sigma – into
all its important management procedures, such as the
R&D department, purchasing unit, human resources
department and asset management department. GE’s
implementation resulted in USD 300 million in profit
in 1997, and a 15% increase in profit to USD 2 billion
in 1999.Due to the resulting success at GE and Motorola,
many more companies, such as Texas Instruments, US
business machine (IBM) and 3M were motivated to
incorporate Six Sigma into their business processes and
experienced astonishing results. Table 1 outlines the
development of Six Sigma.
2.2. The definition of Six Sigma
In statistics, Six Sigma means that for every 1 millionmeasured values, only 0.002 do not meet the pre-determined specifications; 0.002 ppm (part per million)translates into a percentage yield of 99.9999998 itemsthat meet the specifications. Compared to the qualitylevel set by Motorola, which measured four Sigmaquality levels plus possible variation, the positive andnegative deviation value was 1.5, the allowable defectwas 3.4 ppm, and yielded a 99.99966% achievementrate, as shown in Table 2 (Ball 1994).
2.3. Six Sigma roles
The Six Sigma improvement method also containsseveral roles, such as the creation of the ‘WarriorClass’ which includes: Master Black Belts, Black Belts,Green Belts, and so on (Voelkel 2005). After thetraining programme is completed, candidates receive acertificate. Figure 1, provided below, shows the rela-tionship among the different roles.
2.4. The role of the IT department
The traditional goals of the IT department are to build,develop, implement, operate and maintain informationdelivery systems. The IT department is the one in chargeof IT infrastructure and related activities, such assoftware and hardware evaluation and organisation,data storagemaintenance and the networkmanagement(K.C. Laudon and J.P. Laudon 2002). Nowadays,enterprises have been confronting a dynamic changerelated to both external and internal environmentsbecause of the existence of fierce competition encoun-tered day by day. To meet these new challenges,businesses need to constantly maintain their competi-tiveness to effectively control and deal with the external
Table 1. The development of Six Sigma.
Year Summary
1980 Bill Smith, one reliable senior engineer in Motorola, created the most original Six Sigma reports under the supervisionof President Bob Galvin.
1990 Quality control concept entered into the age of ‘Total quality management’. But due lack of the experience, themanagement level implemented the concept of TQM from the top to the bottom, which caused the failure and thewaste because of nontransparent objectives.
2000 Motorola integrated the concept of Six Sigma and process quality management, which proved the benefit to ensureimproved quality. Motorola then carried out extensively this revolutionary introduction and implementation. UsingSix Sigma, Motorola not only made the important improvement in quality and associated processes, but alsoemerged as one of the prestigious worldwide businesses.
2003 Motorola has applied Six Sigma concept to all departments internally within the entire enterprise, and institutionalisedit into what we called ‘functional collaborative model’.
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operations. As for internal management, businesseshave to adopt information systems (ISs) to improvetheir internal efficiency among the departments.Furthermore, ISs are also used to timely support theirproduction and service processes, to accurately control/allocate internal resources, to promptly manage infor-mation to provide necessary assistance in executing andtracking of companies’ major decisions. Therefore,helping businesses to gain their competitive advantagesto meet the fierce marketing competition becomes oneof the most important responsibilities for IT depart-ment (Jiang et al. 2003). Help-desk systems havebecome increasingly critical in assisting the corpora-tions in maintaining customers’ satisfaction (Kang et al.2007). Help-desk systems can be employed to retrieve/access the information exactly required to assist a userin a timely manner. This help system proves to bevaluable for a lazy user if she/he knows little about thetask domain and also for an advanced user if she/he
requires more specialised information to deal with aparticular matter. Traditional help-desk system suffersfrom a number of disadvantages (Foo et al. 2000) whichare provided as follows:
(1) The process is time consuming and expensive.(2) A certain number of service engineers are
needed to provide the desired service support.(3) The database of service records may only be
used by the service engineers.(4) No automatic provision of expert advice is
available for use.
Many employees view users’ support as one of themost important criteria while evaluating the perfor-mance of a particular IT department. To this end, oneof the most important issues for managers is how toimprove the users’ service support to be as effectiveand efficient as possible to meet users’ requirementsand satisfaction.
Figure 1. The organisation of Six Sigma.
Table 2. Statistical comparison of Six Sigma definition and Motorola.
The definition of statistics The definition of Motorola
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2.5. Evaluate and assess the IT performance
In the study of DeLone and McLean (1992), ISresearchers argued that both academic institutionsand industries should have a standard instrument toevaluate/assess the important relationships betweenusers’ satisfaction and the successful implementationof ISs. Further, the same research justified that thecritical success factors to implement an IS can beclassified into the following five categories: systemquality, information quality, system utilisation, users’satisfaction and impacts on individuals andorganisations.
DeLone and McLean (2003) had further presenteda modified model to evaluate the success of imple-menting an IS. In this aforementioned research, theynoted that the evaluation of service quality, in additionto use system quality, should be included to assess ISs’processing efficiency and information quality. Thisstudy done by DeLone and McLean indicated furtherthat some aforementioned attributes discussed earlierwill, in fact, affect users’ satisfaction and willingness tosuccessfully implement an IS.
According to the study of Frank Hayes (1998), it ispossible to affect the enterprise’s capability to use theIT if a sequence of programmed instructions and/orprogramme functions are only used to measure theperformance of an IS department. Additionally, theperformance measurement for an IS departmentshould be performed by these users who understandthe related business processes.
The reason that enterprises usually encountereddifficulties/problems in their prior investment assess-ment projects is simply because their senior executivesare either not familiar with or do not understand theparticular IT. It comes no surprise to see the failure ofIT investment projects ranging from the expensivecosts of the computing equipment, the inadequate rateof return on investment (ROI), to the large andcomplex application systems which do not tailor theusers’ needs. In addition, even IT managers admit thatit is difficult to accurately assess the resulting efficiencyand productivity in the computing or IT industry.From the aforementioned discussion, it is noted thatthe results obtained from the business processes arerather difficult to be utilised to quantify a reliableassessment of the ROI.
The study of Saunders and Jones (1992) suggestedthat the assessment of IT performance should includethe items given as follows.
2.5.1. Managerial assessment
From the perspective of corporation’s operationalstrategy, the integrations between IS and business
functions should be considered as an important
issue. IS must be able to minimise organisational
operating expenses and strengthen IT staff ’s
development.
2.5.2. Information assessment
Business managers should support the quality of
information product, improve users’ and manager’s
attitude towards ISs, enhance IT staff ’s capability and
assist the integration of IT department and other
organisational departments. By doing so, better system
development and implementation will no doubt,
increase the operational efficiency of an ISs.Ameen (1989) argued that the factors to assess
the efficiency of an IS should include factors such as
production rate, utilisation rate and associated costs.
Furthermore, the assessment of the effectiveness of
an IS should be composed of the following factors
such as feasibility, timeliness, accuracy and quality.
As businesses place more focus on the assessment of
efficiency, it may possibly lead to a situation of
reducing costs at the expense of decreasing produc-
tion quality. On the contrary, if businesses care more
about the assessment of effectiveness, the operational
efficiency may have a negative tendency to be
diminished.As the needs and related budget for ISs are
gradually increasing, the performance assessment for
the IT department becomes an important issue since
enterprises have to rely on ISs and associated infor-
mation technologies to maintain/improve their orga-
nisational performances. The early assessment of ISs is
usually restricted to the areas of operating system and
the trading system. To this end, it is common to see
that the managers of the IT department in the past had
placed great emphasis on the operating efficiency and
the timely response to address the problems encoun-
tered within an operating environment. Further, the
managers of the IT department had usually employed
the following factors as a vehicle to handle the
performance assessment of the IT department. These
factors include turnaround time, machine’s reliability,
costs saving and the extent to which the project is
accomplished as previously scheduled. Actually, the
performance assessment for the IT department should
be performed in a controlled and well-planned manner.
Its main purpose should be aimed at uncovering the
potential problems in the IT department and hence,
improving the effectiveness of the overall operation of
the IT department as a basis for any future improve-
ments and/or enhancements.
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3. Research methodology
The case study approach is a powerful researchmethodology that combines interviews with recordanalysis and observation. Using this method, research-ers extract information from a number of varioussources such as company brochures, annual reports,sales receipts and newspaper and magazine articles,along with the use of direct observation, and thenconsolidate these results obtained with the interviewdata gathered from participants. The objective is toobtain multiple perspectives of/from a single organi-sation, many situations, different events or variousprocesses at a point in time or over a period of time.This research is conducted based on the application ofSix Sigma concept, DMAIC quality improvementmethod, and verified by case study empirically toconfirm the result of improving the service efficiency.In other words, this study selects a case company,Campal Company, to apply the Six Sigma concept andDMAIC quality improvement method as a proposedresearch design.
In the past research, a simulation was first appliedto the existing procedure, and then a new procedurewas developed to analyse and calculate the anticipatedbenefit; but the resulting estimation was a poordiagnostic. This research, on the other hand, intro-duces the Six Sigma quality method in order toimprove the present repaired request procedure; itthen applies the improved procedure to the casecompany, which results in a substantial financialbenefit. The calculation of this benefit is based on theamount of manpower and processing time that issaved. We will discuss the research methodology, thetheory construction and the research procedure instudy chapter as follows:
3.1. Case study
This case study applies a research strategy focusedmethodology. According to Eisenhardt (1989), theresearch strategy methodology will focus the casestudy’s attention on all of the possible outcomes in asole environment. Leonard-Barton (1990) believed thatthe case study was a length of time in history or anevent which occurred at a specific point in time asrecognised by several sources, such as visual observa-tion, systematic interview and governmental and per-sonal collection of material.
Case study can be used to understand the market-ing process in particular detail. Using this method,researchers usually select the specific organisation orsituations to profile first. This is simply because theseexamples and/or subjects will offer some critical,
extreme or even unusual cases for researchers tostudy and analyse. In the case study, interview partic-ipants are invited to share the story of their experience.Only those who can represent different managementlevels within the same organisation or provide differentperspectives of the same situation or process areallowed and chosen to provide the relevant perspectivein depth.
3.2. Case selection
The case selection in the case study is an importanttopic. The case should represent the population, and itsresults should also represent the population. Pastresearch pointed out that when choosing an object tostudy, the researcher must consider whether the casefits the research goal, in terms of social relations, andparticipant’s coordination, both of which are deter-mining factors in whether or not the data materialanalysis is complete. Eisenhardt (1989) pointed outthat it is not suitable to use a random sample whenconducting research through a case study; this meansthat the researcher must take extra care to analysepotential cases and to determine how fairly each onerepresents the population. Cash and Lawrence (1989)suggested that in order to choose a suitable researchcase, the following two principles should be followed:
(1) Choose an important and decisive case that hasthe greatest probability of refuting the pro-posed theory.
(2) Choose the most typical case that will produceresults that are representative of the entirepopulation.
3.3. Six Sigma DMAIC methodology
In order to eliminate variation, the Six Sigma qualitycontrol system focuses on the improvement of utilisa-tion; DMAIC circulation (Starbird 2002), is also apopular improvement method (Figure 2). In terms ofthe improved product and process results, the repre-sentation of DMAIC is as follows:
3.3.1. Define phase
In this phase, top management should define the SixSigma goal and estimate the financial benefit throughcustomers’ and other users’ feedback.
3.3.2. Measure phase
In this phase, the material collection and the critical toquality (CTQ) is the vital mission. A suitable
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measuring system should be developed, the correctgauging method should be used, and the goal should beset up according to customers’ and other users’demands. The foundation quality analysis graphics,such as the Plato chart, control chart and histogram,should be used.
3.3.3. Analyse phase
The case procedure should be designed along withfinding any variation and bottlenecks in the process. Inorder to determine the causes of these problems,customer dissatisfaction should be analysed by apply-ing either the cause-and-effect diagram or the FEMA(failure mode and effect analysis).
3.3.4. Improve phase
In this phase, the solution must be proposed and itsefficiency should be analysed.
3.3.5. Control phase
It must be confirmed that the procedure is undercontrol after the improvement programme is launched.
The control plan must be developed in order to preventmistakes; a control chart and check sheets are essential.Moreover, the solution should be standardised, andintegrated into the quality control system.
4. Case study
4.1. Case introduction
According to IDC 2008, Taiwan has a total exportvolume of 27,990 thousands of notebooks to thecountries worldwide. Evidence in the Science &Technology Policy and Information Center (NationalApplied Research Laboratories) has declared thatQuanta, Compal, Wistron, Inventec and ASUS arethe top five original design manufacturers (ODM)manufacturing firms in 2008 Q2. Other details aregiven in Table 3.
Until now, C Company (the abbreviation ofCampal Company) is the one which implements theSix Sigma technique to improve its quality. Thiscompany in Taiwan has a total capital of NTD 38.8billion and hires 3500 employees. Further, C Companyincreases its sales up to USD 23 billion in 2009, and isestimated to reach USD 30.8 billion in 2010. Therefore,
Figure 2. The DMAIC cycle.
Table 3. Ranking of global ODM manufacturing firms.
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there are some concrete evidences showing that this
case company is worthwhile to perform an investiga-
tion about the relationship between the implemented
method ‘Six Sigma’ and its high sales.From its beginning as a supplier of computer
peripherals in 1984, C Company has relied on profes-
sional management and strong R&D to continuously
expand. Today, it is one of the world’s leading
manufacturers of computer notebooks; its computer
monitor products are well known for their high
quality, and it is steadily expanding into web commu-
nication and portable products of the digital field. To
offer fast and flexible service, C Company has estab-
lished branches in the People’s Republic of China,
England and the US By working together with its
parent company, Worldwide Logistics Group, Compal
has become known throughout the industry as a leader
in computer and IT products.Located in Taipei’s Neihu District, C Company’s
corporate headquarters include its administrative and
management divisions, sales and sourcing centres, as
well as its R&D groups. Here, each project is
completed in a step-by-step fashion, and executed by
seasoned teams with nearly two decades of experience
in product research and development; these projects
are also supported by fast and efficient in-house
communications and investment in the latest technol-
ogies. In fact, R&D capability of C Company is the key
factor in its ability to easily win customers’ trust and
brand loyalty. With more than 1000 highly skilled
technical staff, C Company can react to any possible
technical challenge in the development of its computer
and information-related products.Over the years, C Company has learned that a
product’s competitiveness is based on quality, cost and
on-time delivery. Experienced in forming in-house
R&D groups for a varied list of ODM customers, no
matter whether their product be computer notebooks,
monitors or other newly emerging web communication
products, C Company can quickly respond to design
changes necessitated by a fast changing marketplace.In addition, it has applied for and has been grated maypatents worldwide due to its innovative products andcreativity.
In addition to developing and manufacturing itswell-known computer notebooks for internet applica-tions, C Company’s management team carries outmultiple industry layouts with foresight, structuring acomplete supply chain, including communications,panels, integrated circuit (IC) packaging andmanufacturing. Looking towards the future, CCompany has full confidence in its ability to continueto prosper in the competitive IT industry. By the year2009, with its worldwide workforce reaching over20,000, C Company will push its annual sales beyondits target to more than USD 10 billion, making itselfthe world’s largest manufacturer of notebooks.Working together, diligently and harmoniously,C Company’s staff will continue to exceed expectationslong into the future.
4.2. The implementation procedure and result
In the infant stage of the implementation of Six Sigmainto the case company, a Six Sigma executive team,united by related department employees, must beestablished. The team should be charged with propos-ing the Six Sigma implementation plan to the com-pany’s executives. We will explain the relatedprocedures by using the five steps given in thefollowing sections.
4.2.1. Define phase
4.2.1.1. The problem description.
(1) According to the 2002 IT help-desk statisticaldata, 22,413 requests are expected to beimproved.
(2) If the total request is 22,413, it takes3,766,142min to solve; the average processingtime is 168min per case.
Figure 3. Cause and effect matrix.
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(3) The processers are not able to handle morethan one request at a time; resulting in acongested process.
(4) The present help-desk has no complete controlsystem set in place.
4.2.1.2. Case choosing. Using the ‘Cause and EffectMatrix’, shown in Figure 3, it can be determined thatthe ‘IT Help-Desk Improvement’ is our best choice;with a grade of 545, it fits the following threeconditions: it consists of a proper set of team members,it is expected to save at least NTD 1.5 million and it iscapable of being managed (Table 4).
The summary of define phase is given in Table 4.
4.2.2. Measure phase
The PC, network and e-mail processes account for74% of process time. In order to reduce the requesttime or process time, the service quality must beincreased; please refer to Table 5.
In the suppliers, inputs, process, outputs, customers(SIPOC) diagram (Figure 5), we discovered that:
(1) There is a substantial length in time betweenthe point at which users submit requests andwhen they are solved. Therefore, in order to
reduce this service time, it is necessary toimprove IT service quality.
(2) The processes are unable to handle multiplerequests at the same time, resulting in thecongestion phenomenon.
(3) The results cannot be tracked, because therewas a lack of effective working platforms andtools that caused different types of requestswith different processing conditions to occur.
(4) The help-desk lacks a complete inductionanalysis for the knowledge library.
Table 4. Summary of define phase.
Problem description (1) According to 2007 statistical data, there are about 22,413 IT help-desk issues that need tobe improved
(2) With 22,413 issues, it will take 3,766,142min to solve all of them, while averaging 168minper case
(3) The processers are unable to handle requests that are raise at the same time, resulting inthe congestion phenomenon
(4) The help-desk has no complete control system to follow
Project goal (1) It is estimated that the processing time will be reduced by about 46%(2) A NTD 2.01 million reduction in payroll expense
Project scope (1) Everyone in the IT department related to the network, office-application, notes and e-mail
Process indicator (1) Total manpower equals five people (three people from the network servicedepartmentþ one person from the IS departmentþ one person from the IT department)
(2) IT engineers’ average monthly salary: NTD 38,000(3) Expected improvement: Reduce 46% of the process time
Financial indicator andcalculation steps
(1) Help-desk repaired about 22,413 requests last year(2) Present total process time
Sum (number of issues� average process time)¼ 3,766,142minthe expected total process time is ‘total process time’� 54%¼ 3766,142�54%¼ 2,033,717min
(3) Total present manpower� present total process time¼ future demandedmanpower� expected total process time5� 3766,142¼Y� 2033,717–4Y¼ 9.26 people, if we want to enhance the service level,we must hire at least 9.26 people. Due to the fact that there is no recruiting plan, we mustimprove the present procedures by using the Six Sigma quality improvement method
(4) Hard savings¼ improvement–before improvement¼ 9.26 persons–5 persons¼ 4.26 per-sons. The conversion amount¼ reduced payroll cost¼ 12 month payroll� reducedemployees¼ 38,000� 12� 4.26¼NTD 1,942,560 per year
Note: The PC, network and e-mail processes account for56% of occurrence times; please refer to Figure 4.
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In order to improve the present procedure, theideal detailed procedure chart was developed(Figure 6).
In order to estimate the efficiency of the solution,we estimated the process capability (Cpk) to be 0.69,and estimated the sigma level to be 2.07, please refer toFigure 7 and Table 6.
The summary of measure phase is given inTable 6.
4.2.3. Analyse phase
The ability of the present procedure needed to beconfirmed by process time, and waiting time; byreferring to the ‘In the Process Time Graph’(Figure 8), we discovered that the three peaks occurreddue to differences in process time.
In the ‘Waiting Time’ graph (Figure 9), we discov-ered that this variation is too big, and needs tobe improved; the outliers are too far spread out, andare the result of requests that were made duringnonworking hours or the standby period cross duringthe workday.
In the working time chart (Figure 10), we deter-mined that the outlier is too far due to the increase inrequests during nonworking hours.
We discovered that processing time causes a greatdeal of variation and accounts for 79% of the totalwaiting time. Therefore, the goal is to decrease thevariation in waiting time (Table 7).
The summary of analysis phase is given in Table 7.
4.2.4. Improve phase
As depicted in Figure 11, the plan to the solution wasfully developed.
Analyse the execution and solution of theexperiment.
4.2.4.1. Generate the solution. New eHelp-desk systemfor the web (Figure 12 and Table 8).
The summary of improve phase is given in Table 8.
4.2.5. Control phase
To confirm the optimisation procedure indicator,please refer to Table 9.
Figure 5. Help-desk SIPOC diagram.
Figure 4. Focus by occurrence times.
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Figure 6. Ideal flowchart.
Figure 7. Process capability analysis for ALL.
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Figure 9. Process capability analysis for waiting time.
Figure 8. Process capability analysis for processing time.
Table 6. Summary of measure phase.
Project goal (1) Reduced present process time by 46%Project goal selection andanalysis
(1) According to the type of repairing request, choose the one that needs to be improved theleast: (waiting time)
(2) Current Z value is 0.84
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Figure 10. Process capability analysis for working time.
Need to be assigned to another one
DataPolicyUsers
ProcedureTools
TrainingNew hiredemployee
Unfamiliarwith the
procedureUn-install tool
Wrongdefination
No consultant
Questions aretoo complex
Unfamiliar withthe tool
Un-complete data
Supplementatry
Figure 11. The solution conception – cause and effect diagram.
Goal Z: 1.5; DPMO¼ 16,7725 (DPMO, Defects per million opportunities)Indicator USL¼ 200, �¼ 70, �¼ 86Description of goal setting Z¼ (X��)/�¼ (200� 70)/86¼ 1.5, promote the Z value from 0.81 to 1.5Variable Waiting time
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To confirm the financial benefits of the eHelp-desk,
please refer to Table 10.
(1) Hard savings: reduction of manpower cost
NTD 199,800/monthly
Hard savings
= Reduction of manpower (MP)� average
salary (NTD/MP�month)
=(9.26� 4) (MP)� 38000 (NTD/MP�month)
=NTD 199,800/month(2) Potential savings: reduction of waiting time
The summary of control phase is given in Table 11.
5. Conclusion
5.1. Research conclusion
Six Sigma concept depicts a ‘Triangle Relationship’that combines three attributes – customer quality,science manners and team work. In this study, theauthors intend to figure out the most important factorsaffecting the satisfaction to the use of IS. By applyingto a case of eHelp-desk system, the case company
User Login
Get the base data
Filled the request type and
classification
Request confirmation
Logging into DB
Yes
No
Mail th administration
User Login
Administrator
No
Display the request without
acceptance
Yes
No
Yes
User Login
Display the request without
processing
Administrator
AcceptSwap request
Inform the users it is under
process via e -mail
Notify users and administrator
the request has been changed
via e-Mail
Fill the request into
the form
Change the request type
Warning page
Update the progress
Notify users and administrator
the request has been changed
via e-Mail
Swap request Process
Change the request type
Inform the users it is under
process via e -mail
If it is complete
No
Yes
User Login
Display the request without closing
Close
Finish
Filled out the request form
Accept Process Close
Figure 12. eHelp-desk flowchart.
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indeed gained a substantial financial benefit and alsothe dramatic improvement to service quality.
In this study, the case company had successfullyapplied the eHelp-desk system to improve its requestplatform service quality. The entire process is stilloperational and is now managed by the proposedsystem; from the time that the user raises a request tothe time that it is settled. Also, the users may check theprogress of their requests through the eHelp-desksystem. Other systems developed in the future couldalso automatically update customers on the progress oftheir requests. The improved eHelp-desk system alsoguaranteed that all future requests are competed in theshortest time possible. The financial benefits resultingfrom this new system are estimated to be NTD1,942,560 per year, and the latent financial achieve-ments will be NTD 26,856 per month; the repair timefor each customer request will be reduced from 131 to71min.
5.2. Research contribution
Service quality and customers’ satisfaction are twoimportant issues in the area of marketing. If oneorganisation cannot understand what customers need,it may be possible to lose the competitive advantages inthis dynamic environment. Customer survey andquestionnaires are the popular ways to accomplishthe aforementioned objectives. In this study, theauthors intend to combine IS and IT facilities togetherto improve service quality and enhance customers’satisfaction. This is a critical attempt accomplished inthis study. Compared with other prior research toconcentrate on either ISs or the facilities, this studyprovides an unique niche. In addition, most prior
research and/or studies had only applied ‘Six Sigma’concept in the organisational production processes.This study actually applies the Six Sigma concept in the‘service process’ rather than the production process. Byusing the case study, the authors uncover that, even inthe information service industry, ‘Six Sigma’ conceptreally plays such an important role in improvingservice quality. This may be another important contri-bution in this study. Moreover, there are some otheradditional contributions including the following items:
5.2.1. For service engineers
There are some key factors in designing/developing asuccessful system which can be used by service engi-neers. The timing factor is always important for acustomer. If the customers spend too much timewaiting for the system to deal with their problems,they will lose their patience. Consequently, the businesswill be lost. Accordingly, service engineers can useeHelp-desk or other sophisticated equipments toincrease the system efficiency.
5.2.2. For managers
It is noted that the managers in a company must makea trade-off decision between the factors of financialbenefit and customers’ satisfaction. In C Company,managers actually found out that this investment didimprove the implementation of ISs; and reduce thetime to deal with customers’ questions. As a result,customers get the needed satisfaction and managers, inturn, get customers’ loyalty. In addition, the time
Table 11. Summary of control phase.
Summary of control phase
Procedure control plan Using the important factor(e.g. The question submissionmethod, processes tool and soon), to generate the procedurecontrol plan.
Generate the solution: (1) Generate the solution conception.(2) Produce and decide the solution.(3) Implement the solution.
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saving from the adoption of this new system do allowthe managers to handle more marketing-related affairs.
5.2.3. For researchers
Service quality is an interesting stream sinceParauraman, Zeithaml and Berry (PZB, 1985) pub-lished their paper in the Journal of Marketing. Thisstudy represents a study which reflects a perspectivefrom the area of IS. Compared with the study by PZB,this study provides more empirical evidence and otheruseful findings to confirm the relationship betweencustomers and companies. ‘Six Sigma’ concept offers astrong base of methodology for the purpose ofresearch. In summary, to compare service qualityfrom different disciplinary perspective (marketingversus ISs), to compare and analyse the findingsbetween PZB’s study and this study, and to useSix Sigma concept to perform other studies, are allinteresting topics for future work.
The achievements of this case study can be used inother companies and future research, because the casecompany was sufficiently of its industry; accordinglythe results of this research will be provided to domesticacademic and business communities. Regarding the ITdepartment, by applying information science, we wereable to improve its service procedures through areduction in nonessential communication, andimprovement in enterprise users’ satisfaction in orderto retain customers and increase customer service level(CSL) by applying this technique.
5.3. Future work
The accompanying research for the case company canbe relied upon in terms of its industrial nature and theorganisation of its IT department in order to proposefuture solutions at other companies. Furthermore, thisresearch only implemented the Six Sigma DMAICquality improvement techniques; in future research, theSix Sigma and balance card and/or the total qualitycontrol methods could be applied. In addition to thequality standard, related procedures must be rede-veloped and redesigned in order to fully satisfycustomers’ needs. All of the present Six Sigma corre-lation literature applies the DMAIC method in orderto improve the procedure; future research may applythe Six Sigma, DMADV (definition, measurement,analysis, design, verify) method, into the procedure.
Of course, this case was conducted in a specificsetting, C Company in Taiwan. The general conclusionsof the model to other settings may be limited.In addition, our research design only included onlyone system and did not include other websites systems.
Researchers may want to repeat this study in a differentsetting and/or to include the analysis of other systems.By doing so, the benefits of and the findings may bedifferent. Finally, due to the use of case study, cross-sectional data could not offer a good interpretation andforecast to other companies. It is highly suggested tohave future research to be expanded to include thesimilar company in the same industry or to include thecompanies in other industries.
Acknowledgements
This study is partially supported by the National ScienceCouncil, Taiwan (ROC), under the Contract no. NSC98-2221-E-036-029. The authors also gratefully acknowledgethe helpful comments and suggestions from the reviewers,which have improved the presentation and the content of thisarticle.
Notes on contributors
Shing-Han Li is an assistant professorin the Department of InformationManagement in Tatung University,Taiwan. He received his MS in com-puter science and information engi-neering from Tatung University,Taiwan in 1996, and PhD in informa-tion management from NationalChung-Cheng University, Taiwan,
2006. His current research interests include Service quality,ERP system, web services and information auditing andassurance.
Chi-Chuan Wu is an assistant profes-sor in the Department of BusinessManagement at Tatung University,Taiwan. She received her MS in busi-ness management from TatungUniversity, Taiwan in 1997, and PhDin management science fromTamkang University, Taiwan in2010. Her current research interests
are in the applications of multivariate analysis, e-commerceand knowledge management. Recently, she has published herwork in the Journal of Information Science, Expert Systemswith Applications, Production Planning & Control,International Journal of Business and Management andJournal of Human Resource Management.
David C. Yen is currently a RaymondE. Glos professor in business and aprofessor of MIS of the Departmentof Decision Sciences and ManagementInformation Systems at MiamiUniversity. He is active in researchand has published books and articleswhich have appeared inCommunications of the Association
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for Computer Machinery (ACM), Decision Support Systems,Information & Management, Information Sciences, ComputerStandards and Interfaces, Government Information Quarterly,Information Society, Omega, International Journal ofOrganisational Computing and Electronic Commerce andCommunications of Automatic Identification System (AIS)among others. His research interests include data communi-cations, electronic/mobile commerce, database and systemsanalysis and design.
Ming-Chih Lee is a master student atthe Department of InformationManagement in Tatung University,Taiwan. He was a PLM system andOracle database administrator inCompal Electronics, Inc., Taiwan.His research includes Six Sigma meth-odology, enterprise application inte-gration and software componenttechniques.
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